Aging boomers want better health care than their parents are getting

Sixty-three per cent of boomers say one of their biggest fears about aging is not getting the health care they'll need, while a third of Canadians who are 75 and older also concede that they have little confidence in the country's health-care system, results of a Leger Marketing poll showed.

Photograph by: Allen McInnis/Postmedia News files
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Brian Gerstein has watched his parents cope with long wait times, expensive medical bills and living in pain as they grow older.

At 85, his father takes multiple medications for several heart conditions while his mother, 76, has battled skin cancer and had a knee replacement after an uncomfortable months-long wait.

"They have to fight for their health care, they have to be aggressive, they have to be on top of their doctors and they have to use their contacts. Sometimes, they have to jump the queue and do what it takes to be able to get themselves looked after," he said.

"That's the reality of it. I see it first hand."

Gerstein, a Montreal native who now lives in Toronto, is on the tail end of the baby boom generation at 47 years old, but his outlook on aging is already gloomy.

His concerns on facing an uncertain future are shared by the majority of his baby boomer peers, a national survey suggests.

Sixty-three per cent of boomers say one of their biggest fears about aging is not getting the health care they'll need, while a third of Canadians who are 75 and older also concede that they have little confidence in the country's health-care system, results of a Leger Marketing poll showed.

The poll was conducted for Revera Inc., a seniors care provider that operates retirement homes and home care and long-term care services across Canada and parts of the U.S.

Overall, 85 per cent of boomers say they're not content with their prospects for aging — they want a better experience with getting older than what their parents and grandparents have gone through.

"We need to re-imagine what it will mean to live in a seniors society, and the implications that may have for a number of areas, including health care, housing, transportation and more. We need a national seniors strategy to address all of these things correctly," said Jeffrey Lozon, Revera's president and CEO.

"The lack of confidence among the boomer generation was pretty sobering," said Lozon, a former CEO of St. Michael's Hospital in Toronto and a former Ontario deputy minister of health.

The next crop of seniors will be in the workforce longer than their predecessors, they want to be more physically and socially active and the majority want more control than their parents and grandparents had, the survey noted.

By 2025, one in four Canadians will be 65 years old or older, Lozon said.

When asked what their No. 1 priority is for aging, 64 per cent of respondents said "wanting to be able to choose where they live as they age."

Receiving care at home for as long as possible and receiving care on their own terms were also important factors in their future.

Both boomers and Canadians over 75 years old agreed that officials should work on providing seniors care under these terms.

"The type of services available for seniors and the range is very confusing. It's not just going to the hospital and getting admitted," Lozon said.

"We need to recognize that seniors of the future are not the same necessarily as the seniors in the past. The system ultimately has to be more comprehensive, flexible and it has to clearly define what our society is going to do," he said.

More than 80 per cent of boomers and 70 per cent of respondents over 75 agreed that Canadian society is "failing" to respond to the needs of older people.

Those surveyed said that greater access to home care was a bigger priority to them than better government-funded drug coverage.

The online survey of 1,563 Canadians was conducted between Sept. 21 and Oct. 2. The results have a margin of error of 2.5 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.

Sixty-three per cent of boomers say one of their biggest fears about aging is not getting the health care they'll need, while a third of Canadians who are 75 and older also concede that they have little confidence in the country's health-care system, results of a Leger Marketing poll showed.

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